Final Exam Autism – dis/lit 20

Richard’s Final Exam Paper on Autism-Prompt #3

Richard Yeomans

Dr. Foss.

English 384-Section 01.

April 27, 2020

Word Count: 1225

Final Exam Essay: Prompt #3

In our society today, there is the beginnings of understanding for Autism and those who have been diagnosed on the Autism Spectrum. While we continue to see much misunderstanding within society at large, including those who fear Autism and parents who wish to blame their child’s diagnosis on an outside source such as vaccines, others chose to see the individual as a person instead of looking at them through a label from the spectrum. During the Great Depression of the 1930s, many states, including Virginia, utilized Eugenics programs as a means of punishing those whom the state saw as inferior genetically to the average person. In John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, we see hints of the character Lennie having traits which lend him to be on the Autism Spectrum, and how society viewed him as a menace because of his intellectual challenges. George would get frustrated with Lennie at times throughout, only to then see that Lennie was keeping what George taught him to heart. Yet it reflects how both historically and in the modern day, there is still much which needs to be done to raise awareness and end the negative views towards those who have been diagnosed on the Autism Spectrum.

While the novella remains a popular story for many students throughout the country, there are those who identify with Lennie and his personality. Throughout the story, he is treated as a subhuman character by others, including George at times who treats him as a mere child and not an adult. One such example near the start of the story was when George discovered that Lennie had “rescued” a dead mouse and was keeping it in his pocket as a pet. When George had thrown it away a second time, he then heard Lennie begin to cry at the thought of no longer having the mouse. George talked down to Lennie by then saying “Blubberin’ like a baby! Jesus Christ! A big guy like you” (Steinbeck 9). Indeed, Steinbeck had even dehumanized Lennie at the very beginning, comparing Lennie to a bear when he described Lennie’s dragging of his feet while walking as “the way a bear drags his paws” (Steinbeck 2).

Because Steinbeck frequently describes Lennie by his appearance throughout the novella, the reader risks developing, or ratifying, notions that Lennie is not normal. This in turn risks a subconscious determination of seeing others in a negative light based solely upon their differences to what society considers a normal human being. During the Great Depression, the reader also would have been confused about how George and Lennie were even together, as the common practice of families back in that period was to send people with disabilities to an institution. But importantly, though George at times is harsh in his attitude towards Lennie, he does care about Lennie and wishes to prove society wrong about Lennie. Though he told Lennie to be quiet, it was likely due to George knowing that is Lennie had spoken upon arrival, the ranch would have sent them away out of fear and the labels of society towards people like Lennie. George, however, wishes to prove the ranch owner, and society in general, that Lennie is just as capable of hard work, or perhaps even more capable, than the average ‘normal’ person. While Lennie is a hardworking individual on the ranch, George must guide him throughout and remind Lennie of his tasks to avoid getting fired. Lennie in turn looks at George with trust and relies upon George to help him in his daily activities and decisions.

There are several aspects to Lennie’s behavior which lends credence to the idea that his condition falls upon the autism spectrum. He is frequently seeking out the repetitive behavior throughout the story of wishing to pet soft items, which can also be thought of as self-stimulating (Murray 14). As previously noted, he is introduced to the reader with a dead mouse in his pocket which he pets frequently ass he and George are walking along towards the ranch, with George then throwing the mouse away across the river, only for Lennie to walked across and recover the dead mouse whilst fetching wood for a campfire. When George then throws the mouse away for a second time, Lennie argues that it is a comfort for him, He tells George that he “wasn’t doing anything bad with it… Jus’ strokin’ it,” which is our first view into the repetitive and comforting behavior which Lennie seeks out (Steinbeck 9). The reader is then informed by George that Lennie had destroyed a stuffed toy mouse which had been previously given to him. This behavior is reinforced by Lennie being too hard on his petting and stroking of puppies, with another character on the ranch named Slim having suggested that Lennie take a break from petting the puppies, with Lennie explaining to George that Slim told him he “better not pet them pups so much for a while” (Steinbeck 54). To which Lennie eventually kills one f the pups by being too aggressive in his petting.

Lennie continues his desire to seek out and pet soft objects when he comes across Curley’s wife and starts petting and stroking her hair. Unfortunately, when he is told to stop by her, Lennie becomes anxious and fears that she will tell George about his forcibly petting her hair against her wishes, and that George will punish him by not allowing him to pet the rabbits on their future plot of land. He acts out in a panic and ends up killing her, which then causes the realization that George is not going to be happy with Lennie and will punish him.

In Stuart Murray’s book Autism, he notes that autism “isn’t in illness” and that that fact is “sometimes lost in the labeling of the condition as a ‘disease’” (Murray 36-37). He goes on to then explain that even in the modern society, people tend to fear and misunderstand autism due to the fear of the unknown. Though our understanding has improved, there are many parents and general members of society to this day who fear autism as a disease, and are wary of those who have been diagnosed on the higher end of the autism spectrum, while certain other parents feel self-blame in their child being autistic (Murray 59).

In closing, though we as a society have made great strides with the arrival of advocacy groups intent on educating the greater public and families about autism, in the hopes of a wider acceptance of people as being equal and normal with those who are not on the autism spectrum, especially when compared to the 1930s when individuals were simply hidden from society under the guise of being “feeble-minded,” we have a long way to go unfortunately in obtaining full acceptance and equal equity to all Americans whether on the spectrum or not. Though George did work hard to try and bridge the gap between Lennie and the other workers and the owner of the ranch, he did achieve some successes along the way before the end of the story, notably with Lennie being allowed to continue working instead of being sent off upon noticing that he wasn’t “normal” in the eyes of society. And continued work will be needed to ensure full integration and acceptance going forward.

I pledge…

-Richard Yeomans.

Works cited

Murray, Stuart. Autism. Leeds: Routledge, 2012.

Steinbeck, John. Of Mice andd Men. Penguin Books, 1937.

Adam’s Final Paper

Adam Cooper

Dr. Foss

Disability Lit

26 April 2020

A Different Approach at Parenting

Jim Sinclair’s Don’t Mourn For Us outlines the perception a new parent may have upon finding out their child is autistic. In three sections it highlights the struggles parents may have with understanding the disability and how it affects the relationship they’ll have with their child. I found this to be my favorite piece in the autism unit mainly because it seems like it would be impactful to a large demographic of people. In some cases the way a child’s disability, in this case autism, is handled can actually make the effects of the disability much worse than they would be otherwise for both the parent and the child. To be a good parent to a child with a disability it is essential to not allow any grief you feel to ruin the relationship with the child, understand in certain cases it is not a curable ailment, and to learn to listen. As Sinclair explains this may mean no matter what you do the relationship will not be the normal one you had imagined but that’s not to say it won’t be a beautiful relationship regardless. This piece does a wonderful job of outlining the negative effects a parent can unintentionally have on a child with any disability, not just autism and can be related to other disabilities we’ve studied throughout the semester. In order to properly care for someone with a disability it is essential to not try to divide the disability from the person but rather to adjust the style of care given to them to better accommodate them. The big issue is trying to make the child fit into a mold the parent has created instead of changing the parenting style to fit the child. The issue becomes more about the parent and child and in trying to comfort themselves a parent may do harm to their child they are unaware of.

Sinclair recognizes that grief, in the case of a parent learning their child will have a disability such as autism, can be traumatic. But the issue comes when the trauma the parent experiences overshadows the disability itself. Caring for those with disabilities requires the caretaker to devote their time to the disabled person, not to dealing with their own feelings about disability. A distant example we see of something like this is from early in the semester when we read Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. If we compare Victor to the parent and The Creation to the child it becomes a pretty clear example. Victor wanted a beautiful being and had imagined that whole heartedly. When The Creation was not what he had imagined he went into a state of grief completely neglecting the creation and letting it slip further away from him without care. The Creation genuinely just wanted to be loved and cared for but Victors own grief prevented that. Obviously I’m not insinuating that those with autism or other disabilities are “creatures” or “monster-like” but the parent-child relationship is present here along with the neglect that can be found alongside a grieving parent.

The first section titled Autism is not an appendage discusses the idea a parent may have that there’s another child within the “shell” of autism. A child that can fulfill all the dreams the parent had for them. This is problematic as attempting to uncover a person within will amount to nothing. I think a large misperception of all disabilities is that there’s a normal person within the disability who’s been caught by it. So instead of starting to understand who that person is with the disability we make their lives harder by trying to break them out of a mold we’ve imagined them being in. Take for example someone born with only one leg, you wouldn’t try to cure this as it’s clearly visible there is no “cure” and a real leg will never grow there. So you change the style of care you had envisioned giving the child. According to Sinclair, this problem is present in the relationship between parent and child when navigating autism. Sinclair says “It is not possible to separate the autism from the person–and if it were possible, the person you’d have left would not be the same person you started with.” (Sinclair) This is a clear example of how parents attempting to “free” their child from autism would create a rift in the relationship. Spending all the energy you have attempting to create a new child as opposed to parenting the one you have will never lead to a new child, rather one who is neglected and may suffer from the side effects from autism worse than they would have otherwise.

Communication is huge in any relationship, especially between a child and parent. However for someone with autism, communication can be extremely difficult. This means it’s the parent’s job to accommodate this and in turn help nurture a relationship and do their part in helping their child be the best they can be. A huge part of what we can do to help anyone with a disability is to merely listen. Far too often those with disabilities are drowned out by the hustle of everyday life and it leaves them without the assistance they need. Even in everyday life it’s easy for us to not hear what someone with any disability is saying. We go about our day to day lives not considering things from their point of view, not out of intentional rudeness but due to lack of education. For someone with autism they may not be able to flatout say what they feel in a way that a parent can hear and understand without education and changing the way they parent. Sinclar says “Each of us who does learn to talk to you, each of us who manages to function at all in your society, each of us who manages to reach out and make a connection with you, is operating in alien territory, making contact with alien beings.” (Sinclair) I think the same may apply to any individual struggling with any disability. To talk and not be heard is without a doubt extremely discouraging. Functioning in a society built for those without disability is hard enough, not being heard makes it harder.

Sinclair’s work goes a long way in humanizing those with disabilities, especially autism. Far too often we see children and adults alike who have disabilities as missing something. And in some cases this makes us grieve for them rather than care for them. In a parent child relationship this can have even more significant effects. Near the end of his passage Sinclair says “The tragedy is not that we’re here, but that your world has no place for us to be. How can it be otherwise, as long as our own parents are still grieving over having brought us into the world?” (Sinclair) This speaks not only about a parent and child struggling to build a relationship around a disability but also about everyone who lives around us with any disability in a world built for everyone else. There is no easy path for any parent and I’m sure I can’t comprehend what parenting is like but I think Sinclair’s work helps start to paint a more clear picture of what a parent can do to help their child and what we can do to help those around us.

Words: 1,230

I pledge – AMC

Sinclair, Jim. “Don’t Mourn For Us” Autism Network International newsletter, Our Voice, Volume 1, Number 3, 1993.

Erin Smith’s Final Paper on ‘Misfit’ by Tito Mukhopadhyay

Erin Smith

ENGL 384: Section 1

Dr. Foss

28 April 2020

Misfit: Autism and Nature Imagery

It seems very fitting that I read a story about an autistic child’s interaction with a parent right after rereading the poem Misfit for this assignment. The man was recalling a time he went to Disneyland when he was young, and he came across two other kids who were interested in his Stitch plush that he was carrying around. Happy to meet people who like the same character he does, he begins to stim by flapping his arms. The very ableist mother of the two children found the behavior abnormal and didn’t want her kids to interact with him, but the other two children were perfectly fine with it. In ‘Misfit’ by Tito Mukhopadhyay it is adults like that mother that label the speaker a misfit, but the other information in the poem says otherwise. Misfit compares autistic behaviors to images of the natural world, combating the idea that these behaviors are “wrong” or “weird” as most people see them to be.

In the first stanza, Mukhopadhyay describes the earth as “turning and turning.” One common form of stimming is spinning objects, such as tops or the classic fidget spinners that were so popular a few years back. It’s an activity that brings them entertainment and relaxation. Just like autistic people, the earth spins (on its axis). The stars don’t see any abnormality in this behavior in the earth, and they chose to leave it alone rather than bring attention to it or label it something. After all, the earth’s spinning is a natural process; why should anyone call it out? Moving back to fidget spinners, they were increasingly popular for neurotypical people for some unknown reason, but at the same time those same neurotypical people would make fun of autistic kids for using them. Fidget spinners and fidget cubes were made for those with learning disabilities that can’t allow them to sit still or focus without some kind of outlet, such as ADHD and autism, to have an inconspicuous object that lets them stim without distracting the class. Yet neurotypicals took it and made fun of those it was made for. It even became an ableist meme at one point, although the popularity of the “toy” overshadowed most of the memes. I remember from high school watching some of the mean students make fun of one of our special needs boys for having one. Yet in this poem, Mukhopadhyay takes this behavior that is often stigmatized by neurotypicals and compares it to a natural, beautiful process. He claims there’s nothing more wrong with the behavior than the earth’s spinning.

Next in the poem, the birds appear as the earth continues spinning. They flap their wings just like autistic people do when they’re excited or happy (a behavior I’m very familiar with because I do it myself. ADHD is now being considered by some people to be autism’s cousin so an overlap in behaviors is not a surprise). Mukhopadhyay specifically notes in this part that the birds know he was autistic, and yet they still “found no wrong with anything” (MUKhopadhyay line 9). They flap their wings to fly, so they see his flapping as just as natural as theirs. He’s doing what he needs to do to survive comfortably and not in a depressed state. Just like birds who have their wings clipped, autistic people who aren’t allowed to stim often feel depressed. From personal experience with stimming, when someone looks at me wrong or tells me to stop when I’m flapping, my mood drops significantly. Stimming is a natural part of autistic behavior and those who do it should not be forced to stop. After all, it’s like clipping a bird’s wings, isn’t it?

The people, the men and women, however, view his behaviors differently than the stars or the birds. They stare in a way that can only be considered disgusted or appalled, because they label him a ‘Misfit’ in the next line. This stanza is meant to reflect society’s view on autistic behaviors, rather than those of the natural world. To society, what he does is unnatural. These people that do so fail to see how his behaviors are more connected to the natural world than they think. They fail to correlate the earth spinning with his spinning, or the birds’ flapping with his flapping. To them, he just isn’t like the other kids; he doesn’t do the same thing the majority of children do. Clearly there must be something wrong with him, right? While they see only something weird and out of the ordinary, the speaker and other images in the poem see it as completely normal.

He says so himself in the next stanza when describing the blowing stim: “I found no wrong with anything” (line 15). He thinks it’s nothing more than a cool trick to blow like the wind, not another one of the odd behaviors the men and women in the last stanza thought they were. He sees how this fun trick is similar to nature, describing himself as the wind. Blowing raspberries or just blowing out air in general, they’re both traits of stimming that are often seen in autistic children. Not only does he find it perfectly fine to do these activities, he wants to share them with others. He sees it as something that other people and other children will enjoy too. And in the final stanza, he questions why anyone should stop doing these behaviors. He asks the reader, “Why stop turning and turning / When right can be found with everything?” (lines 16-17) This final question comes in direct opposition to his past repeating phrase: “found no wrong in anything.” Now rather than seeing that there is “no wrong in anything,” he sees that there is all right in everything. What he does, what the birds do, and especially the earth’s spinning, they are all part of the natural world and are all good, right things to do. Not to mention the first line could be interpreted as his wish that the men and women would see the right in everything as he does. He wishes they could consider these autistic behaviors as natural and perfectly ordinary.

‘Misfit’ is a poem about an autistic child labeled as such because of his “abnormal” behavior, but he sees himself as the opposite. Using images of the earth, birds, wind, and stars, he compares his stimming activities to the natural world and creates this picture of autism being just as ordinary as other things in the world. He disregards the view of those who consider it not to be, and instead lives on happily as his autistic self.

Word Count: 1108

I hereby declare upon my word of honor that I have neither given nor received unauthorized help on this work